GeForce GTX 280 vs Radeon HD 6970

Intro

Compare all that to the Radeon HD 6970, which features a GPU core clock speed of 880 MHz, and 2048 MB of GDDR5 RAM set to run at 1375 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is comprised of 1536 SPUs, 96 TAUs, and 32 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GTX 280		236 Watts
Radeon HD 6970		250 Watts
	Difference: 14 Watts (6%)

Memory Bandwidth

As far as performance goes, the Radeon HD 6970 should in theory be a lot superior to the GeForce GTX 280 overall. (explain)

Radeon HD 6970		176000 MB/sec
GeForce GTX 280		141696 MB/sec
	Difference: 34304 (24%)

Texel Rate

The Radeon HD 6970 is a lot (approximately 75%) faster with regards to AF than the GeForce GTX 280. (explain)

Radeon HD 6970		84480 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GTX 280		48160 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 36320 (75%)

Pixel Rate

The Radeon HD 6970 will be quite a bit (approximately 46%) better at FSAA than the GeForce GTX 280, and also will be capable of handling higher resolutions better. (explain)

Radeon HD 6970		28160 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTX 280		19264 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 8896 (46%)

Please note that the above 'benchmarks' are all just theoretical - the results were calculated based on the card's specifications, and real-world performance may (and probably will) vary at least a bit.

Price Comparison

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Memory bandwidth is the max amount of information (in units of MB per second) that can be moved past the external memory interface in one second. It is calculated by multiplying the card's bus width by its memory speed. If it uses DDR type memory, it should be multiplied by 2 again. If it uses DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the bandwidth is, the faster the card will be in general. It especially helps with anti-aliasing, High Dynamic Range and high resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum number of texture map elements (texels) that are applied per second. This figure is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the graphics card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels processed in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum number of pixels the graphics card could possibly record to its local memory per second - measured in millions of pixels per second. Pixel rate is worked out by multiplying the amount of ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for drawing the pixels (image) on the screen. The actual pixel fill rate is also dependant on quite a few other factors, especially the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the memory bandwidth is, the lower the ability to reach the maximum fill rate.